Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a dental instrument applied to orthodontic treatment, and more particularly, to a dental wire supporter, which is fixed to the teeth so as to support a wire for orthodontic treatment and limits the position of the wire, and an orthodontic device having the same.
Description of the Related Art
For most modern people, look, in particular, appearance has been established as one of standards for judging a person at interviews for employment, admission into a school, etc., and acted as a very important factor in social life, for example, a great part of interpersonal relationship, etc. Particularly, the appearance generally depends on teeth and a set of teeth. Accordingly, orthodontics has recently been prevalent for correcting teeth, a set of teeth or a facial skeleton, along with surgical plastic operation.
The orthodontic treatment is a concept that refers to a treatment of correcting malocclusion, for example, narrow orthodontics of simply strengthening irregular teeth to a nice set of teeth. The orthodontic treatment can correct various skeletal irregularities that may occur during a growth process, thereby contributing to healthy oral organization and further making a beautiful face line to get beautiful impression by changing the anatomical structure of the mouth.
Orthodontic treatment may be categorized into, for example, treatment for gradually moving the set of teeth to improve misaligned teeth or the like odontoparallaxis, growth modification which facilitates or suppresses the growth of the facial skeleton of a patient who is in the period of growth, and orthognathic surgery, which performs a surgical operation on the facial skeleton, more particularly, the jawbone, so as to realize skeletal improvements.
In other words, in the case where treatment by only simple teeth movement is insufficient because of excessive abnormality of the engagement of upper and lower teeth or of the facial skeletal structure, more particularly, the jawbone structure, growth modification may be applied to the jawbone structure during an adolescent period, in which growth is not complete and the abnormality of the jawbone structure is not great, whereas orthognathic surgery, which surgically corrects the abnormality of the jawbone so as to realize a functionally efficient and/or aesthetically pleasing face, may be applied, in combination with other treatments, to the skeletal structure of an adult, the abnormality of which is a medium level or more.
The orthodontic treatment may be broadly classified into labial orthodontics and lingual orthodontics. Here, the labial orthodontics refers to a method of straightening teeth by attaching a brace to a surface of a tooth at a labial side, and the lingual orthodontics refers to a method of straightening teeth by attaching a brace to a surface of a tooth at a lingual side.
As an example of the brace, there are an orthodontic wire, and a wire supporter (generally called a ‘bracket’) for supporting the orthodontic wire, etc. The bracket is a labial-side and/or a lingual-side of the tooth. A plurality of brackets are provided along a direction of tooth arrangement, and connected by the orthodontic wire, thereby transmitting orthodontic force from the orthodontic wire to the set of teeth.
Orthodontic treatment takes a long time depending on the state of the patient, and there are various kinds of orthodontic treatment including, for example, treatment for alleviating crowding or spacing of the anterior teeth, treatment for reducing protruding lips, and treatment for filling space after the extraction of a tooth or space attributable to tooth loss.
Meanwhile, among the various kinds of orthodontic treatment, orthodontic treatment in which the anterior teeth are moved toward the tongue, that is, the roof of the mouth, is referred to as lingual traction. In the case of the protrusion of teeth in which the teeth of the patient abnormally protrude forward, the lips appear to protrude. Therefore, the above-noted lingual traction has been proposed as one solution for the correction of protruding lips. In addition, in the orthodontic treatment for alleviating the crowding of anterior teeth, the anterior teeth are spread and pulled toward the tongue.
When treatment is advanced in the conventional manner upon administration of the orthodontic treatment described above, because a wire passes through three brackets of posterior teeth as anterior teeth are pulled rearward, friction between one of the three devices (brackets) and the wire is intensified, thus stopping the rearward movement of the anterior teeth and causing lateral movement of the anterior teeth and the posterior teeth. This phenomenon may considerably increase the time required for treatment.
For orthodontic treatment for various purposes as described above, an orthodontic device, which includes, for example, an orthodontic wire configured to suit the treatment purpose and brackets, is installed within the mouth of a patient, and the orthodontic wire is moved simultaneously with the movement of teeth.